Leaders desire what they don’t have and reach for what they haven’t reached.
Unfulfilled passions frustrate.
Drive encounters barriers.
Barriers block the future and frustrate the present.
7 Barriers of Leadership:
- Failure to name wins. Fear prevents you from naming what you really want. But, you can’t achieve what you haven’t named.
- Unrealistic optimism. Thinking the path ahead is short, smooth, and easy.
- Deliverables over developing people. Attaining goals is the easy focus of leadership. People are messy.
- Plans without champions. Wouldn’t it be great if plans magically happened? Who owns success?
- Ignoring barriers in the false hope they will magically vanish.
- Big passion without small deliverables.
- Lack of focus.
Breaking barriers:
- Acknowledge you’re stuck. Progress is a function of discontent.
- Name barriers. What’s preventing progress? Don’t assume you know.
- Connect with people who share your frustrations. Common frustrations reflect common enemies. Frustration is more powerful than contentment.
- Focus on people. The horses in the barn determine where you can go. Foolish leaders set short-term goals that teams can’t achieve.
- Embrace small, simple wins. A small win today is worth two tomorrow. A series of small wins lengthens leadership’s reach.
- Make plans by exploring the past. What repeated patterns emerge that must be leveraged or addressed? What are common points of failure or success in your past?
- Do more of what works. Breaking barriers is necessary but focus on what’s working. Or…
- Stop doing what’s working. When barriers persist, what you think is working isn’t.
- Bring the outside in. Find and integrate people who think differently.
- Identify and follow champions. Every barrier needs a champion whose working to break it. Competent champions galvanize teams that produce success.
- Forget the barrier. Choose a new path.
- Change the team. Identify the person who is the barrier and convert or remove them.
Bonus: Create enough wins that barriers become irrelevant.
What barriers do leaders encounter?
How can leaders break through barriers?